


smells like roses to me (tastes so bitter and so sweet)

by chemicalpixie



Category: Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika | Puella Magi Madoka Magica
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, One-Sided Attraction, Or Maybe Not So One Sided?, Other, You Decide, mentions of bullying
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-24
Updated: 2018-07-24
Packaged: 2019-06-15 17:13:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,717
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15417705
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chemicalpixie/pseuds/chemicalpixie
Summary: “the two of them don’t spend much time with the other girls, because the other girls glare at chouko when their boyfriends send her love letters or look longingly her way. chouko tries not to worry about it. of course they’ll understand eventually, right? she never meant to make them fall in love with her. she just wanted to be beautiful. she just wanted to be loved.”or; before there was gertrud, there was chouko himura, and she was a magical girl.





	smells like roses to me (tastes so bitter and so sweet)

**Author's Note:**

> i've always been fascinated by the pmmm witches and been thinking about writing fics about their prior lives on and off for years, and i was skimming my docs today and the notes about gertrud caught my eye, and well. then i cranked this out in an afternoon. this may or may not become a series, depending on how inspiration hits. i also might edit this later, if the inspiration hits. we just don't know.
> 
> the title is a modified lyric from james arthur's “roses”; please kudos and comment if you enjoyed, it means a lot to me! <3

“i wish to be beautiful,” chouko says. she is staring at herself in the mirror. all she can see is the flaws that the other girls at school mock. 

“done,” the cat-creature says, and there’s a glowing in her chest, and a deep, aching pain she can’t quite identify, and then she collapses to the ground.

she looks in the mirror, and she can see no flaws. 

//

she goes into class the next day, and all she hears when the teacher calls her name are whispers, rather than the laughs and titters she’s used to, and she flicks her ruby-colored hair over her shoulder and pretends not to hear them.

at lunch, akahana approaches her. “hi,” she says, sitting down and putting her lunch next to chouko’s. “i’m akahana suzuki.”

“i know who you are,” chouko says, trying to sound aloof. really, she’s just excited to not eat lunch alone. this will be the first time in a long while she’s had company. she tries not to show it.

akahana makes a noise of surprise. “oh,” she says softly. “you’re chouko. chouko himura, right?” chouko nods, and akahana smiles, and chouko smiles too. she can’t remember the last time she smiled at someone like this. butterflies swim in her stomach, and she tries to brush them off as nerves.

//

when she’s not hunting witches, chouko spends most of her time with akahana. they go shopping, and to karaoke, and chouko tries to pretend that the butterflies in her stomach are excitement. the two of them don’t spend much time with the other girls, because the other girls glare at chouko when their boyfriends send her love letters or look longingly her way. chouko tries not to worry about it. of course they’ll understand eventually, right? she never meant to make them fall in love with her. she just wanted to be beautiful. she just wanted to be loved. 

//

“it’s just the two of us,” akahana says. she’s sitting on the floor in a bathroom stall, across from chouko. she’s just found gum in her beautiful ruby-red hair and she’s spent the last period sobbing in the bathroom. “they don’t matter. you know they’re just jealous of you.”

“i know,” chouko says, but she doesn’t. things don’t feel much different than they used to, back when she was ugly and all the girls teased her. she sniffles again, and akahana puts her hand on chouko’s knee. she squeezes it gently, and chouko tries not to notice the way her stomach twists all up in knots at akahana’s touch. 

akahana smiles at her. “it will all be okay,” she says, and chouko doesn’t doubt her for a second. 

//

they have a sleepover at chouko’s house and make dinner together, and dance around the kitchen in socks, slipping and sliding, and laugh until their stomachs ache. eventually, akahana falls asleep while they’re watching a movie, her head on chouko’s lap. chouko strokes her hair and realizes that it doesn’t matter what the other girls think of her. she doesn’t need anything more than this.

//

“i’m sorry,” chouko says. she feels bad, she really does, but kyuubey has been bugging her about the amount of witches in the city for weeks now. this is the third time chouko’s had to turn akahana down this week. “tomorrow, okay? i promise.” akahana nods, and chouko thinks she can see a glimmering of tears in her eyes as she turns away. must be a trick of the light, chouko thinks. akahana understands. she knows i have a job to do. 

she doesn’t know what the job is, chouko isn’t _stupid_. but she had to tell her something about where she goes when she has to fight witches, and that was the first lie that slipped off her tongue. 

she texts akahana that night after she gets home from a witch hunt. **home safe** , the message reads, and then, chouko sends, impulsively, **love you.**. akahana doesn’t reply. she’s probably asleep. that night, chouko doesn’t sleep. instead, she tosses and turns in her bed and tries not to worry. 

//

she’s standing sopping wet in her magical girl outfit with her mace by her side. she’s just lost a witch’s familiar she’d been following around a corner when she sees akahana walking with her friends, the ones she’d told chouko she wasn’t friends with anymore. chouko yells after her, and akahana tells them to go on; that she’ll catch up, and stalks back to chouko standing under the streetlight. 

“what are you doing?” chouko asks, tone low and angry. she knows, she knows. she just needs to hear her say it. she thought that it was going to be the two of them, forever and ever (chouko is trying not think about it but she thinks she might love akahana more than a friend should. she pushes the thoughts from her mind. she’ll think about that later). “i thought it was just the two of us.”

“what are you wearing?” akahana asks, looking chouko up and down. “is this some kind of costume? where do you work?” there’s scrutiny and judgement in her glare that chouko doesn’t like. 

“none of your business,” chouko mutters, crossing her arms across her chest. “what are you doing with them?”

akahana looks like she’s going to say something, but has stopped herself. she pauses, then scoffs. “fine. don’t tell me.”

“i don’t have to tell you,” chouko snaps back at her. “just because we’re friends doesn’t mean i have to tell you everything, you know.” she’s defensive, sure, but she can’t tell her that she’s a magical girl and has been fighting witches. akahana would think she’s crazy. 

“oh, we’re friends?” akahana asks bitterly. “because you sure haven’t been treating me like one. and besides,” she adds, a pulse of anger coursing under her words, “you really thought i liked you?” akahana’s lip curls. there’s something hauntingly sad in her eyes, and something rehearsed about the way she says it, but chouko can’t focus on anything besides what she’s saying. she wants to scream, but she can’t manage to make a single sound come from her mouth. “just because you became pretty, you really thought we were friends?” akahana laughs, and it has the air of something calculated and cruel. “we went from hating you because you were ugly to hating you because you were too pretty!” she snaps, a malicious bite to her words, and then laughs again, just as cruel and calculated as before, and something in chouku snaps. 

she’s on top of her before she knows what she’s doing. the mace is landing on akahana’s skull and the thorn-like spikes are leaving dents in her skull, and blood the color of blood-red roses begins to leak from her skull and mix with akahana’s green hair in a sickening puddle. 

chouko moves off of akahana and vomits. what has she done? what has she done? she wipes bile from her mouth and looks up to see kyuubey sitting next to akahana’s body. “tsk, tsk,” he says. “how are you going to clean this up?”

“you have to fix her,” chouko sobs. “i didn’t mean to, i swear. i just didn’t want her to love anyone else,” chouko cries, admitting a truth she hadn’t known until it spilled out of her mouth, and she can hear sirens in the distance and that sets off another wave of sobs, because she knows it’s too early for them to be coming for her but she knows they will come, and she sobs again. she strokes akahana’s hair, smoothing the flyaway hairs, and closes her eyes. akahana isn’t breathing, not anymore. 

“kyuubey, please,” chouko pleads. “you can grant wishes. you can bring her back, i know you can.”

kyuubey shakes his furry little head, and chouko collapses onto sobs on akahana’s body again. “i already granted your wish,” he says. “you wished to be beautiful, so that she would spend time with you. and she did.”

“not like this,” chouko sobs again. “if i kill more witches, can you save her? i’ll kill double the ones before, i swear it,” she pleads, and kyuubey sighs. 

“i can’t promise anything,” he says, but that’s all chouko needs. 

she springs up, but not before pressing a quick kiss to akahana’s forehead. “i’ll save you,” she says. “i promise.” what she thinks, but does not say, is that _if i save you, you’ll have to love me_.

//

she fights witch after witch. grief seeds no longer matter to her, and she lets them clatter to the pavement. she doesn’t deserve a clear soul gem, not anymore. kyuubey pads behind her, following her trail of destruction. “you should clean your grief seed,” he advises, and chouko is getting tired and she’s starting to think he’s right, but then the image of akahana lying on the pavement with blood matted in her green hair flashes in her mind, and she grits her teeth.

“no,” she says. “i won’t.”

kyuubey shrugs, somehow (even though he’s some kind of cat-alien thing, and by all logic, shouldn’t be able to shrug, but chouko doesn’t question it, not now), and he says, “suit yourself.”

she kills another witch, a with with flailing limbs like a spider and she smashes the mace into the body of the spider-witch, and it wails, a frightened, angry noise. akahana’s frightened face flashes across chouko’s mind. she did this same thing to akahana. she killed her. she starts to sob as the witch’s fantastical world dissolves around her. 

kyuubey is gone now, and something in chouko breaks. she can hear a siren as she collapses to the ground, and she knows in her heart that they are coming for her. she hasn’t slept or eaten, or been home, not since akahana, and she thinks that she’s been gone for a day, or two, or three (she hasn’t payed attention to the time, not really. she’s been focused on finding witches to kill), and her parents surely are worried (or they would be, something in her whispers, if they’ve even noticed you’re gone). she knows they’re coming for her now, and the last thing she sees before her soul gem shatters is an image of akahana’s lifeless face, bright red-blood mixed with her green hair and pale face.


End file.
